Special Update!

Hi folks: Thanks for all the feedback! Some of you have asked me to post a link to my book: Iinstant Ppoetry(Just add words!) Here's the link. its available at :http://www.iuniverse.com/Bookstore/BookDetail.aspx?BookId=SKU-000187234,http://www.amazon.com/Instant-Poetry-Just-Add-Words/dp/1450255523/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1296114461&sr=1-1 http://www.author-promotion.com/ and your local bookseller. you should still be able to access this weeks posting in the archives of this blog. just look for the posting titled Ah it was good!  . see you next week.

Ah. It was good!

Hi folks: Boy I had fun at the reading last night! I made $36.50 but that's not the only reason it was a good night. I did my set and got a lot of good reactions from the attendees but the fun really got started during the second half of the show. A local improve poet Named Grace Flores showed up and joined me for some freestyle poetry after everyone on the sign up list went up. After we did a few pieces she put on a clinic giving us her techniques for doing improve and cementing her invitation to an Improve poetry workshop being sponsored in June by the Rochester Poets organization. I'm scheduled to be the other presenter at this workshop so next week I have to go to the Tango again and do the "Impossible". There was a Poet named Peter there last night who declared himself incapable of learning to Freestyle. It's now my personal mission in life to prove him wrong and earn my spot in the workshop. It turns out he's going to be the feature next week at the Tango so my work is cut out for me. Wish me luck! Here's this weeks poem:

Change is good for the soul.

By Lawrence R. Berger

In the natural progression of life

things work like this :

First, you learn how to do it.

Next you get good at it through experience

then you show others how.

Take talking for example.

at first

you start out with a few words

when you're about two or three.

By the time your five no one can shut you up!

During your teenage years you learn to talk to your friends
and actually say something interesting.

By the time you reach thirty

most people have enough experience talking to begin to teach their kids how or

share their native tongue with someone from a foreign land.

It's that way with most things in life I'm beginning to find

but the transitions are hard !

It's easier just to continue to learn new things all your life

then to put yourself out there on a limb and risk it getting sawed off from

under you .

But it's been said that the natural progression of life is

birth , childhood, teenage years, adulthood, old age and finally death

and no man may deviate from this progression and still call themselves human.

I've found a loop hole though.

If you follow the natural progression of

Learn, Use, Teach

You can leave behind you knowledge for all time!

Look at the bible!

It's lasted two thousand years plus ! People all over the world are still discovering its teachings!

It's the same for you in your life!

Share you knowledge and you might live forever!

Like Tennyson, Keats,Poe and the others you might be around for a few hundred years longer than you might be otherwise.

Change is good for the soul!

So share the wealth!

see you next week.

Lots of stuff Happening!

Hi folks: There's a lot of stuff going on for me right now. I'm involved in the Rochester Open Poetry Event tomorrow night at St. John Fisher College ( 3690 East Ave in Pittsford ,NY) , I've got my first feature of the year coming up on Tuesday ,January 25Th at the Tango Cafe 389 Gregory St. In Rochester, NY. Email the host at frankjudge@gmail.com for more info or driving directions if you want to come. I also just applied to be listed in the Poets and Writer's Foundation's Directory of Poets. I'm kind of kicking myself for not doing this sooner but in my 14 year career , I'd never thought or knew about this till now. It makes it easier for folks to get Poets and Writer's Grants to PAY YOU FOR YOUR READINGS AND OR WORKSHOPS if your listed. If interested you should definitely visit www.pw.org and look into it! Whew! Like I said there's lots of stuff happening this week. Now that that's all out of the way , Here's this weeks poem:

How I got my name

By Lawrence R. Berger

A lot of people think I'm called " Laughing" Larry Berger

because I have a very powerful , unique and infectious laugh.

While I do posses this , that's not the reason!

Some people think it's because I earned money

by having up and coming comics pay me to either listen to jokes

over the phone or sit in the audience at there auditions

and laugh at their jokes giving them a better shot at jobs then they might otherwise have had. While I did do this , that's not the reason either!

Some folks think I got my name simply because I like to laugh a lot.

Also, true but still not the reason!

After 14 years in the poetry scene I'm finally ready to reveal the truth behind why I'm called "Laughing" Larry B. Here's the truth:

In 1996 shortly after I did my first featured reading I attended the open mic reading at a place called THE ROSE CAFE in Venice, California. I was doing my APF ( Audience Participation Freestyle!) thing and a fellow poet named Richard Beban called out " Will you please stop laughing, Larry? " and I wrote this:

Stop Laughing?

Why?

What's wrong with having a highly developed seance of humor?

Laughter is a wave of joy and natures first breath.

To stop laughing is to resign ourselves to coffins of skin.

To have eyes vacant of life stare back at us from the bathroom mirror.

Stop laughing?

Somehow

I DON'T THINK SO!

The audience went wild! Everybody Including Richard gave me a standing ovation and I've been "Laughing" Larry ever since!

now you know the truth!

see you next week.

Happy January!

HI FOLKS:

This is my first blog in the wake of the Arizona tragedy . My heart goes out to the families of the victims and those who survived. It kinda sounds insignificant now but I'm booked for the Rochester Open at St. John Fisher College 7-11p.m. (3690 East Ave . Rochester,NY 14618 in the Galisano Gateway center. 1-800-444-4640 0r 585-260- 9006 for directions ) on January 20th, 2011 and at the Tango Cafe on January 25th, 2011 8-11 p.m. ( 389 Gregory St. Rochester, NY 14620 585- 271-4930 or 585-260-9005 for directions) and at the Barnes & Noble in Pittsford ,NY in August. more on these as they develop. I hope you can make it to one of my shows. Here's this weeks poem :

Shooter

By Lawrence R. Berger

No one takes responsibility any more.

The mad get what they want

no matter how many Wal-Marts they have to go to to get it.

Sometimes government is delayed and

decisions put on hold.

The Constitution has held for over two hundred years

in spite of difficult period like today

and "calm times" like the civil war'

It scares me when people like Sarah Palin

actually seem to make sense.

God bless America!

see you next week.

It's finaly here !

Hi folks : Welcome to the second decade of the Twenty First Century! Lots going on ! Projects are being finished , I'm starting new ones. I've even been asked to teach a couple of classes and I may even get the chance to do them. I've also got a couple of readings lined up and the book appears to be selling well. More on these events as they unfold . Now, Here's this weeks poem:

Dreaming

By Lawrence R. Berger

Not,just for nite time any more.

Days are filled with the miracles they bring now too.

I can see clearly again!

Some years you just know you won't do well

but this year is starting off wonderfully!

I hope yours is too!

See you next week!